


Apple Tree

by rewmariewrites



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Fae & Fairies, Fae Magic, Gen, Inspired by Music, Magic, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Nemeton, Nemeton AU, Nemeton!Stiles, One Shot, Post-Nemeton, Sheriff Stilinski's Name is John, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 14:49:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19378912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rewmariewrites/pseuds/rewmariewrites
Summary: Stiles is floating.





	Apple Tree

**Author's Note:**

> so... I realize it's been a hot minute since I've posted anything at all. Sorry! All I'll say is that abt 6 weeks ago I started a new job and started dating someone new at the same time. I hate my job, but my new partner makes me the happiest I can ever remember being, so there's that. 
> 
> Have fun with this very very short one-shot, based on a song from an artist I can't remember. I'll update this note if I figure it out!
> 
> <3

Stiles is floating.

No - it’s more like hanging. He’s hanging, suspended in the air, by one small tether. It’s a precarious feeling, like one swift breeze could send him tumbling to the ground, leaving him bruised and aching just under the skin.

(Isn’t he already aching, though? He aches in a million ways, in a million places, for a million different reasons. He hurts, _all the time._

He’s a little glad for the pain, if only because it keeps him sane.)

It’s almost like he’s an apple - _that’s_ the metaphor he’s looking for. He’s hanging from the branch, ready and waiting, like an apple that’s ripe for the picking. The Nemeton doesn’t grow apples, but - Stiles is magic, isn’t he? Or, rather, the Nemeton is magic. If Stiles _wanted_ it hard enough the Nemeton could probably grow apples, and then Stiles would truly know whether the feeling he feels is apple-ish. Apple-y? Apple-ish.

Stiles is _exhausted._

He’s exhausted most of the time, now, even though he doesn’t really do anything. It’s the Nemeton, he thinks - it takes and takes and takes Stiles’ energy, like it’s a starving crowd rather than a partially-sentient tree. That’s probably what leaves him feeling so bruised all the time.

(The tree feels… well, it doesn’t quite _feel -_ not in the way humans do, not in the way Stiles does - but it sometimes feels like it’s thinking about feeling bad, for the way it drains Stiles of everything he is, everything he used to be, every single day.)

Sometimes Stiles wonders what would happen if he stripped all the leaves off every branch of this cursed fucking tree in a spiteful, self-serving fit of revenge. 

If he pulled at the leaves would he pull the Nemeton out of himself? Or would he make it worse, until this already tenuous Stiles-and-Nemeton relationship becomes _NemetonStilesNemeton_ and Stiles’ feet become the roots in the savage dust of this stupid fucking clearing, and he doesn’t even have the presence of mind to tell his friends - _his Pack_ \- to stop _fucking_ visiting him.

 _Leave me be, I’m tired,_ he says, but his voice comes out like leaves rustling through the wind, and he knows his friends can’t hear him, even if they can see the way his body is wrapped around the roots of the Nemeton.

 _(Suspended animation_ was Deaton’s name for it. _Cruel_ is Stiles’.)

 _I feel so damn cold,_ he tries, just once, in the cold snap that freezes everything mid-November. It comes out like the groaning of branches, and Stiles fights the urge to scream. Scott leans down and wraps a scarf around him anyways, lays a blanket down, run his fingers gently through Stiles’ hair.

 _Hold me like a child,_ he begs, the one time his father comes to visit. John can’t see the way the Nemeton’s root system has started to encase Stiles’ body - like a shelter, or maybe a prison. John can’t see Stiles at all - Deaton had warned them about that, at the beginning, that John wouldn’t be able to see o Stiles knows - he _knows_ that his father definitely can’t hear him, but fuck… he has to try. 

(He doesn’t know if he can do this for much longer. He doesn’t know if he has a choice. He’s scared. He wants his _dad.)_

 _I feel so damn old,_ Stiles whispers the day Derek finally comes to visit. 

Stiles’ physical body has finally been encased by the Nemeton - Stiles doesn’t know how long it’s been since the process started, but it has to be days, at least. Months, maybe? His friends don’t visit that much anymore - it’s hard to tell how quickly the time passes.

Derek doesn’t find him immediately. He stands there in the middle of the clearing, rigid, like he’s terrified to move or breathe or _exist_ in a space where Stiles existed, once.

(Exist _ed,_ because Stiles isn’t really sure if you can call what he’s doing exist _ing.)_

“Stiles?” Derek whispers, after a moment that feels like a year. It sounds pained, like his voice is being ripped out of him. It sounds like hope. It sounds like he’s ready to be disappointed.

 _I’m here,_ Stiles cries. It comes out like the whistling of the wind between leaves, like the creaking of the boughs of the Nemeton high above where Stiles’ physical body lies.

Stiles doesn’t know how Derek understands, but when the Nemeton creaks, Derek lifts his face and spins around, suddenly frantic and desperate, as if Stiles will suddenly appear beihnd him. 

(Stiles doesn’t know what he’s expecting, but suddenly he’s _terrified._ The Nemeton groans out his displeasure, and it sounds like lightning is splitting its trunk and burning him from the inside out.)

Derek pants, nostrils flaring, eyes red in the fading light of the sky. There are lines where there never used to be, grey where there was 

Stiles sees - really _sees_ \- Derek’s face for the first time since the fae bound him to the Nemeton, _yearsmonthsdays_ ago.

 _You got so damn old,_ Stiles carefully exhales. It catches around something that would have been a sob, once upon a time.

  
(The Nemeton _screams,_ and tears drip down Derek’s cheeks, his lips, his chin.)

**Author's Note:**

> as always you can find me on tumble at rewmariewrites.tumblr.com


End file.
